The Brothers Rule - Carolyn Faulkner Page 0,58

quickly exited through the door.

Later that evening, it was Jace who came to her not long after dinner. He was probably the brother who chafed against her bedtime the least, because he was an early riser—had to be—himself.

She was naked—all of them seemed to prefer her that way, having quickly made that a rule. The only time she got any use out of her nighties or pajamas anymore were the few nights she spent alone in this big bed.

Laurie was already under the covers, but he stood there looking at her with those bedroom eyes of his, and she knew she was in trouble even before he spoke.

"I know you're worried about what we talked about this afternoon, and I have a tried and true remedy to take your mind off of it. So, not so fast, missy, with getting into bed already." He lowered his chin and crooked his finger at her, looking out at her from under a furrowed brow.

She knew better than to try to wheedle him—or any of them—out of it, so she got out of bed and came to him, while mentally running a list of her behaviors through her mind. But she honestly couldn't come up with anything!

"Yes, Sir?" She peeped up at him.

Jace took her in his arms, where he always wanted her to be, and looked down at her.

"I bet you have no idea why you're going to be punished, do you, Miss Laurie?"

Damn! She wished she'd thought of something!

"Uh, I sassed you?" she offered, not quite hopefully.

His gaze narrowed. "You did? When, that I haven't already punished you for?"

She shrugged. "I dunno. I just wanted it to be something simple like that. I have a feeling that whatever I'm in trouble for isn't going to be that easy."

She loved his crooked grin. "And you'd be right about that."

He sat down on the end of the bed and put her down on his knee, those big arms finding their way around her waist to hold her there. "You said something in our meeting with Nick that I find disturbing, and I'm of a mind that you're probably going to revisit this with my brothers, too, when you're with them again."

Oh, joy. Three times the punishment for one transgression!

But she still couldn't come up with anything, certainly nothing worthy of earning a punishment from all three of them.

He tipped her chin up so that her eyes were on his. "I won't make you guess any more, darlin', but I'm not happy that you didn't think of this yourself—that it wasn't your first inclination."

As he spoke, he put her over those tree trunk thighs of his, and she couldn't help but begin to cry already at that—and the sound of his voice. Plus, the fact that she really hated to disappoint him—any of them—in any way, and it sounded as if she'd let all three of them down without even knowing what she was doing!

His big hand rubbed up and down her back as she turned her head to look up at him.

"I love you so much, babygirl. And it's because of that, I was very sad to hear that you'd been trying to hide how badly you were feeling about your work from us."

She opened her mouth to argue with him, a bad habit which often got her into even more trouble.

"No," he scolded firmly. "Don't try to defend yourself. You admitted that, out loud, in front of witnesses. I don't really want to hear any more from you about it. This is more serious than you realize, obviously. Any relationship is built on trust and communication, but ours even more so than others. You have to tell me—us—what you're feeling, good, bad, or indifferent. You cannot actively hide things like that from us, or that's going to cause all sorts of problems down the road. We'll be cruising merrily along, thinking that everything is okay, but you're down and depressed, and we don't know it because you've decided not to show that to us or talk to us about it."

She was going to bring up the fact that they all knew she was unhappy in her job, but she guessed that she hadn't really let them know how bad it had gotten for her.

He began to spank her with no further preamble, but as the stinging smacks fell, he continued. "And I intend to make certain that you remember this the next time you have the urge not to tell us when